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Lucky Luke (character)
|title = Lucky Luke |character_name = Lucky Luke |image = LuckyLuke2.png |imagesize = |caption = Sous le Ciel de l'Ouest (1952), cover of an early softcovered issue. |alt = |debut = Spirou Almanach 47 |debutmo = December 7, |debutyr = 1946 |full_name = Luke |species = Human |homeworld = United States |partners = Jolly Jumper, Rantanplan |enemies = The Daltons |format = Comics album |graphicnovel = y |titles = see full list |lang = fr |genre = see below |publisher = |writers = |artists = |colorists = * Anne-Marie Ducasse (2003–) }} |subcat = Western (genre) |altcat = Pilote titles |sort = Lucky Luke }} Lucky Luke is the title character of the comic series Lucky Luke. A cowboy known as the "man who shoots faster than his shadow", accompanied by his horse Jolly Jumper and in many stories a dog named Rantanplan. Lucky Luke is charged with restoring justice to the Far West by chasing down bandits, the most famous of whom are the Dalton Brothers. The stories are filled with humouristic elements parodying the Western genre. Publication history Both a tribute to the mythic Old West and an affectionate parody, the comics were created by the Belgian artist Morris who drew Lucky Luke from 1946 until his death in 2001. The first Lucky Luke adventure named Arizona 1880 appeared in the Almanach issue of the Franco-Belgian comics magazine Spirou on December 7, 1946. After several years of solitary work on the strip, Morris began a collaboration with René Goscinny who became the series' writer for a period that is considered the golden age of the series. This started with the story Des rails sur la Prairie published on August 25, 1955 in Spirou. Ending a long run of serial publications in Spirou, the series shifted to Goscinny's Pilote magazine in 1967 with the story La Diligence, subsequently leaving publisher Dupuis for Dargaud. After the death of Goscinny in 1977, several writers have filled the role of storyteller, including Raymond "Vicq" Antoine, Bob de Groot, Jean Léturgie and Lo Hartog van Banda. At the 1993 Angoulême International Comics Festival, Lucky Luke was given an honorary exhibition. After Morris' death in 2001, French artist Achdé continued drawing new Lucky Luke stories in collaboration with writers Laurent Gerra, Daniel Pennac and Tonino Benacquista. Lucky Luke comics have been translated into Afrikaans, Arabic, Bengali, Bosnian, Catalan, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Italian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (both in the Brazilian and Portuguese forms), Serbian, Slovene, Spanish, Swedish, Tamil, Turkish, Vietnamese and Welsh. Spin-off series A spin-off series called Rantanplan starring Luke's dimwitted canine sidekick began in 1987. It has been written over the years by several successive teams of writers and artists. The character also got a 76-episode animated television series in 2006. A second spin-off series called Kid Lucky was designed in 1995, aimed at attracting a younger readership. This starred Luke as a little boy, a format that had been very popular with Spirou. Two albums starring this version of the character were released as part of the main series: Kid Lucky and Oklahoma Jim. These were credited to veteran writer Jean Léturgie and unknown artist Pearce, who was later revealed to be a joint pen name for Yann Lepennetier and Didier Conrad. The series was scrapped due to poor sales and the two albums removed from the official list of Lucky Luke albums. The series was however re-launched in 2011 as Les aventures de Kid Lucky d'après Morris, with Achdé now solely in charge of it. To date, Achdé has written three Kid Lucky albums, L'apprenti Cow-boy, Lasso périlleux and Statue Squaw, released in 2011, 2013 and 2015, respectively. The stories Although always described as a cowboy, Luke generally acts as a righter of wrongs or bodyguard of some sort, where he excels thanks to his resourcefulness and incredible gun prowess. A recurring task is that of capturing bumbling gangsters the Dalton brothers, Joe, William, Jack and Averell. He rides Jolly Jumper, "the smartest horse in the world" and is often accompanied by Rantanplan, "the stupidest dog in the universe", a spoof of Rin Tin Tin. Luke meets many historical Western figures like Calamity Jane, Billy the Kid, Judge Roy Bean and Jesse James's gang, and takes part in events such as the guarding of Wells Fargo stagecoaches, the Pony Express, the building of the First Transcontinental Telegraph, the Rush into the Unassigned Lands of Oklahoma, and a tour by French actress Sarah Bernhardt. Some of the books feature a one-page article on the background to the events featured. Goscinny once said that he and Morris tried to base the Lucky Luke adventures on real events whenever possible, but that they would not let the facts get in the way of a funny story. The chronology of the albums is deliberately murky, and in most albums no particular year is given. The villains and incidental characters based on real persons lived over most of the mid-to-late-19th century. For example, in the album Daily Star, Lucky Luke meets a young Horace Greeley, prior to his moving to New York in 1831. Judge Roy Bean, who was appointed judge in 1882, appears in another album, and in another album yet, Lucky Luke takes part in the 1892 Coffeyville shootout against the Dalton gang. Lucky Luke himself appears unchanged in all stories. Except at the very early comics where he shoots and kills Mad Jim, Phil Defer and the old Dalton brothers gang in Coffeeville, Luke is never seen to kill anyone, preferring to disarm people by shooting weapons out of their hands. At the end of each story, except the earliest, Lucky Luke rides off alone into the sunset on Jolly Jumper, singing (in English) "I'm a poor lonesome cowboy, and a long way from home...". Smoking Morris, who had been criticized over Lucky Luke's cigarette for a long time, answered his critics: "the cigarette is part of the character's profile, just like the pipe of Popeye or Maigret". It is claimed that Morris was forced to remove cigarettes Lucky Luke smokes from his strip and Lucky Luke who "used to be a heavy smoker", had to give up smoking for "commercial reasons", apparently to "gain access to the American market". On World No Tobacco Day in 1989, the magazine Spirou published a militantly anti-tobacco issue, #2668. BDOubliées.com - 1989 Spirou index Morris won an award from the World Health Organization in 1988 when he replaced Luke's omnipresent cigarette with a wisp of straw in the story Fingers (1983). In the 2007 animated film Tous à l'Ouest: Une aventure de Lucky Luke, Lucky Luke is seen using what appears to be a nicotine patch and mentions that before that he had to "chew on a piece of straw for a while" right after he quit smoking. In the 1994 story Le Pont sur le Mississippi (The Bridge Over the Mississippi), he is seen rolling a cigarette again, although he claims it was just to hide his boredom. While in Sarah Bernhardt (1982) after despite Luke's strict orders to not light a fire, Bernhardt's cook has lit one to make a cake, Luke is seen rolling a cigarette in an irate mood, strikes a match only for it being blown out by Jolly Jumper who reminds him of his own "no fire" orders. Category:Lucky Luke characters Category:Western (genre) characters Category:Fictional cowboys and cowgirls Category:Fictional orphans Category:Fictional smokers Category:Fictional characters introduced in 1946